AMD marketshare on the rise - hits 19.1 percent

Despite posting unimpressive financial results, AMD's marketshare in the x86 market is on the rise again. According to a report by Mercury Research, Intel's marketshare in the first quarter of 2012 fell to 80.2 percent from 81 percent in Q4 2011, while AMD's marketshare rose from 18.2 percent to 19.1 percent in the same time period.

Overall x86 processor shipments declined in the first quarter compared to the year-ago quarter, which is an indicator of a "not-so-stellar" market, said Dean McCarron, principal analyst at Mercury Research. The company did not provide numbers for the decline rate.

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"When you look on it as a quarterly basis, desktop has had some strength relative to mobile," McCarron said. AMD's desktop processor shipments were hurting at the prime of the hard-drive shortage in the fourth quarter last year, and shipments recovered in the first quarter.

Customers also opted for lower-priced laptops, many of which had AMD's chips. Supplies of AMD's A-series chips code-named Llano were restored after manufacturing issues were resolved, McCarron said.